3G

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I've had a 1st generation iPhone since release in the UK... It's a great phone and by far the best PDA I've ever used. Like the Mac it benefits from the tight OS/Hardware integration... But what really sets it apart is the work of genius user interface, which is unmatched by other devices. I'll be first in line for a 16gig 3G one in July!

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motorollin wrote:
I'll be upgrading to a new 3G iPhone too. I'll unlock the iPhone I've got now and eBay it. Hopefully I'll make back the cost of the upgrade :-)

bloodline wrote:
I'll be first in line

I'm sharpening my elbows...

--
moto

Fine fine... I'll go second then... Gah, you can't take him anywhere :roll: :lol: ;-)

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Nlandas wrote:

spihunter wrote:
 I agree with alot the anti Bill Gates & Apple stuff thats been said here but this is a phone not a home computer.

There's alot of competition on the smart phone market these
days. thats why they keep getting better and better at a fast rate.

Right now the 3G iphone is the "Amiga" of smart phones. I dont care who made it. Its pretty awesome and I'm thinking about getting one.

So, if the anti-christ made a really cool techno-widget you'd be sure to send him your do re me? Yes, it's a phone but it's profits go to Apple. :-P

I don't care who makes it, if it does what I want then I want it!!!

If I needed 3G, I'd wait for the RIM to be done.

Sure but blackberries suck... no question... Spend 10 min with an iPhone, and it feels like you've been using if for years... spend an Hour with a RIM device and you'll wonder why even bothered with the idea of mobile computing devices...

I've used both... the RIM for work and the iPhone personally... and that should explain why I have an iPhone and not a RIM :-)

However, it's not my money - but I send none of it to Apple and as little of it to Microsoft that I can't help.

To each their own. :crazy:

Ahh, for sure, but make sure you are not speaking from personal opinion but from experience :-)

Either Microsoft or Apple will get my money if they make something I want/need :-)

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pkillo wrote:

niklasni1 wrote:

Linux is the platform that really pushed multiuser operating systems into use by consumers

Errh? "No"?

So what other operating system is in widespread use as a consumer desktop, and supports use by multiple users simultaneously? There are plenty of multiuser operating systems [VMS, Solaris, HP/UX, AIX, *BSD, PRIMOS, etc.] but I don't know of any that are popular among consumers besides Linux. And Linux's popularity predates OS X by quite a bit.

Yeah, I'd have to agree, Linux was the first proper multiuser OS that I ever really used... now multiuser is the norm for me with OSX...

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tokyoracer wrote:
I really can't be arsed to waste my money or time with mobiles. Why do people rave on about them? They depriciate like a Lexus, they break all the time and everything is so fiddily.
To me a phone is a phone and that's what I use it for.

Yes... you want a phone... get a phone... I want a fully integrated mobile personal life style computing device... so I got the iPhone :-)

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motorollin wrote:
@alexh
That additional cost also gets you unlimited data and more inclusive minutes and text messages than I personally could ever use within a month. There are many, many phones which require you to take out a contract. The iPhone isn't unique in that respect.

I couldn't agree with Moto more! My original plan was to buy the iPhone, unlock it, use it on my existing Orange Contract.

But when I looked into the Orange Data Contracts, they were £30 per month with a 30Meg per month limit (on top of my existing £30per month plan)... With O2 I get something like (I forget the asctual figures now) 500 mins and 500 text per month and unlimited Data for £35... and given that I regularly hit 800meg download per month on the iPhone... I thought the O2 deal was pretty good.

I'm dumping Orange at the end of this month and moving my Business account to O2... with, an iPhone 3G :-)

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da9000 wrote:

amigadave wrote:
I agree that Apple products are not for everyone, and particularly not for the geek squad that has the technical smarts to want low level control of every electronic gadget

That's such a myth and IT HAS TO STOP RIGHT NOW. I don't know about you, but I breathe technology everyday, hardcore, and I've not had any problems using OSX and Apple products. Granted the older Mac OS (pre-OSX) wasn't that hacker friendly, but as far as I'm concerned give me Linux or OSX, or even Amiga OS, it's the same thing. Just don't give me Windows. Now *that* makes you jump through some real hoops to tweak to your heart's content (without Cygnus, you're handicapped).

I just want to lend my support to da9000 here! I would have to say that Pre OSX the Mac was the worst machine you could use... the OS was clunky, limited, unstable and a real relic of the 80's... Windows95/98 was vastly superior... But with the move to OSX, suddenly Apple gave me a werking stable OS, that was nice and user friendly (as I was used to with Amiga), with a system that didn't need constant maintainance... Plus I also got all the Unix tools I had become accustomed to with Linux...

I never really got networking to work properly with Windows (it was a case to trying eveything until something worked and then never touching it again), but never had a problem in Linux or OSX (networking is a breeze in OSX 10.4 and 10.5).

When Apple moved to intel CPUs finally they became competitive... Something Apple has never been before.

-Edit- The "It just works" holds true as a Professional Music user... All my various bit of Hardware and Software work perfectly without the near endless config one must do when using a Windows machine... Also as a home user who really doesn't want to mess around, but wants to switch on, and do something productive... it also works perfectly. Apple have got the user experience right... and that is what you pay for...

If you've not used OSX 10.4 (I'm not so impressed 10.5 yet :-) ) on an intel Mac then you might not have had such a good experience... but the modern machines are great :-)

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alexh wrote:

motorollin wrote:
There are many, many phones which require you to take out a contract. The iPhone isn't unique in that respect.

But you can get a decent contract for 1/3rd the price of an iPhone contract.

In the UK for example you can get a free handset + 200 mins (to any network) + 200 txts per month for £10 ($20) per month.

Well, for that £10... you get a basic mobile Phone... not a PDA/iPod/Phone... Remember that for £35, I not only get 500mins and 500Text (or there abouts, Moto might remember) and UNLIMITED data, that's the crunch here... the iPhone is VERY data heavy... what with Emails, internet, you tube, and (on the G3) Push calender... I easily download about 800Megs per month... on any other contract that would cost me something like an extra £400 per month...

Ok, I had to pay for my iPhone (£260, if memory serves), but the contract was a good deal... I was happy to pay to be an early user, the iPhone has been great fun... and I needed to replace my old HP iPAQ PDA, so the iPhone wasn't really much of a price hit for me.

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alexh wrote:

bloodline wrote:
I easily download about 800Megs per month [on my iPhone]...

Doing what?

A.org mostly :-D Well, I'm always checking various web sites... I'm almost always on Wikipedia... I reviece lots of Emails, from various people, quite a lot of work is sent to me via Email, which includes PDFs, Album/promo artwork, spreadsheets word documents, and obviously music files, a lot of music files...

I use You Tube to check out artists and to find songs that I want to hear...

I use the wetter app (my iPhone is in German :-D) to check the weather... and the Karten app (Google Maps) to find out where my next meeting is... I also use my iPhone to take test shots location scouts and then Email them to various people (though that is upstream rather than downstream)... Plus when I had my iPhone jailbroken, I ran VNC to control my Mac at home :-)

The iPhone is VERY data heavy...

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alexh wrote:
What is worse, you're a Londoner.. in the city you're never more than a few feet from a free WiFi hotspot?

:lol: Well the O2 Contract does include free "The Cloud" Wi-Fi connection, that proves good in pubs and in the docklands... But most of the time I'm not near a Free or Cloud Wi-Fi point...

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JJ wrote:
I have just had an SMS off O2 (phone network in the UK) even though I am not with them.

"an SMS from O2"... sorry to be a grammar pedant, but that's a pet hate of mine.

Offering me the new 3g Iphone 8GB for free on all traiffs over £45.

If you don't need a billion minutes and texts (I cetainly don't... I'm very Email driven)... then it's better to get either the £35 or Pay-as-you-go and just buy the iPhone... it's pretty good value for a touch screen iPod...

Ummmmmmmm , no thanks

I agree, get the 16gig instead.

Am I correct that genrally in America that you have to pay for the handset even on contract ?

No idea :-)

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Oliver wrote:
I can certainly see the value of the iPhone for someone who needs real mobile connectivity. I just don't. As Alex suggested, I am rarely far from a desktop machine. I certainly don't spend anything like that on my mobile contract.

@Bloodline I guess you do business on the move? I'm in an R&D department, and don't have much need to travel.

Ahh right, yeah! I'm pretty much on the move all the time... and probably more so, with my current work! I guess the iPhone won't be that useful for you...

How good are the personal organiser functions on the iPhone? Is it really convenient and fully featured? I haven't yet found anything I will use other than desktop apps for this. I only really derive schedules, appointments, meetings from project plans anyway. If it could perform that function well, that would be a lot more attractive to me. As it is, I only use my phone's organiser as a reminder service, synced to desktop apps.

As an organiser, the integrated Email/Kalender is brilliant, With my old HP iPAQ it had Wi-Fi (but the sercurity was always out of date) and it wouldn't live sync over the air, so I had to update using a teather back at home... that basicly kept my PDA one day behind at best and more if I couldn't get home... the iPhone is always up to date, it's always on line, live... great :-)

I can't wait for push and exchange support comming in July, that will make my life even easier... as many companies I work with, use M$ Exchange and the push support will be brillint!

I think I will not be really happy with a PDA until there is robust and convenient handwriting interpretation. So far, I am yet to be really impressed, though I haven't bothered looking in depth for some time.

My HP iPAQ had pretty damn good handwriting software, but I found that what I wanted to achive on the move was not best suited to hand writing... and the WindowsCE mobile interface sucks big time... The iPhone's interface is what really sets it apart... it's the first mobile device has a proper interface designed for mobile computing... I wouldn't want the iPhone interface on my Desktop though... :-)

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Wayne wrote:

adolescent wrote:
Not true.  AT&T doesn't offer insurance for the iphone.  You can get the Apple extended warranty, but that doesn't cover theft or loss.

Chalk that up to the "learn something new every day" quotient.  I can only guess, in a situation like this, that if something happens to your phone (any phone, not just an iphone) you back up and try something new, whether buying a replacement off of e-bay or from the manufacturer.  

We are lucky in the UK... Insurance comes as standard on the iPhone...

Cool thing about teh iPhone is that when you connect it to your Mac, it totally backs it up... so if you plug a new one, it "becomes" your old one :-)

I'd just say "be careful and don't drop the damned thing" but there are always circumstances in real life that you can't do anything about.  (spoken as a motorcycle rider)

All you can do is to be careful and maybe buy a protective pouch for it.   That, and don't lay it on the table at Burger King and forget about it.

I decided not to hide my beautiful iPhone in a protective case... and I must confess to throwing the thing around like a rag doll... also throwing it accidentially across the Stamford Brook tube station... some how... the unit has survived and not a scratch on it (apart from the plastic bezel)... Glass and Aluminium are damn fine materials to make a phone from :-)

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Piru wrote:
Tie-in phone deals only became legal in finland year or two ago, and they're only possible for 3G phones. That's why we did't have iPhone (officially) until now.

Speaking of which, technically iPhone 3G isn't really 3G (IIRC the spec demands a front camera). Ok that's nitpicking... :-)

And there you have hit upon my one gripe with the iPhone 3G... where is the front Camera? Ok, everyone I know... and I mean EVERYONE, never uses the front camera... A friend showed it to me, in use once, 4 years ago... but it was all jerky and crap... in fact I was speaking with a colegue and he didn't even realise he had a front camera... But I digress... I WANT A FRONT CAMERA ON MY iPHONE!!! :-D

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Sure the Video Phone is a solution for a problem that doesn't exist... Most phone calls I make are often no more than a minute in length... I almost always moving around or doing something else as well as the call, so even if I did have a video link, I wouldn't be able to look at the camera... And sometimes I don't someone to know where I am... or as mentioned, I might be looking like I've just been run over...

So granted, I would almost certainly never ever use a front camera... but that doesn't stop me wanting one... and even demanding one in the next iPhone ;-)